Make Believe

Logan & Kailey came over for a play date on Tuesday and they all had a fabulous time! They began the day by playing dress up. (Thanks to my mom and the best thrift store in the world (now closed because of all the illegals they hired) we have enough dresses to clothe a small village of princesses.)

The second part of the day we set up a grocery store in the living room and a check out counter in the foyer. The let their imaginations run wild and very nicely took turns being the "payer girl" and the "bagger".

I love that Logan kept her heals on to grocery shop! Does she get that from you, Carrie?

He's Powerful!

God saw all that He had made,

and it was very good. Gen 1:31

I have been negligent in doing devotions with the girls lately. Shame on me. It's always an eye opener when your 6 year old asks, "Mom, when are we gonna do demotions again?" For Marley & Ella it isn't enough to just read them a "demotion", a while back I stepped it up a notch with adding an activity or a simple color page that goes along with the theme and now they have come to expect no less. The picture below is of them coloring their picture of things that God has created. I like to use the time while they are coloring to ask questions pertaining to the lesson. It's fun to see how much they actually learned. Ella asked how God created trees and Marley piped in, "Ella, He's powerful!"

Praise the Lord that she does know He is powerful. And praise the Lord that He can use a 6 year old to motivate Mama.

Picnic at the Park!

The girls and I met Heath at the park for an impromptu picnic lunch in the middle of a work day! A nice break from the norm!

Every now and then I like to ask Marley if we will be best friends forever. She promises we will!

Swinging just makes you smile!

I'm not quite sure what Ella is so happy about here. Must have been good!

Happy Birthday, Dear Marley...

Today we celebrated Marley's 6th birthday as well as Heath's 6th Father's Day!! We squeezed in taking Heath out for lunch (in which I had to ask him if he had his wallet when it came time to pay.) I asked the girls what they love about Daddy and they each listed off a number of things ~ topping both of their lists was the fact that he gives them back rubs at night. I don't think Heath minded so much that Father's Day was overshadowed by Marley's birthday because she is the reason, after all, that he can celebrate! Thank you Heath for being such a great dad!

Marley's birthday began with a special trip to Toys R Us with Heath's parents on Friday. They took her out for lunch and to choose her birthday gift. This was a special time for her and I love that they had this idea! Marley really appreciates one on one time. I had prepared myself for anything she might have brought home ~ no matter how big or how useless. This was; after all, her day and I wanted her to feel like a big girl making such a fun decision. I greeted her at the door when she got home and she was standing there w/ a bag of clothes!! How funny!! For a minute I thought she was 15. She had 1st picked a stuffed animal and when they told her that she could still chose something else she was shocked and said "Really?" She got a new outfit, pink canvas shoes to match, fun light up sneakers and a pair of soft pink slippers.

Birthday Morning!!

Marley opened her gifts from my parents before her friends arrived for the sleepover. Another new outfit (really cute!), computer games and a Webkins! She was most excited about the card that my mom sent that played "The Bear Necessities" song when opened. Eventually, we had to make the card disappear for a while.

After Kailey and Tristin arrived, we loaded up and headed to Build A Bear! It was so much fun and the girls had a blast! Marley, Ella, Kailey and Tristin all got matching doggies! Pup, Hardey, Fluffy and Valentine were promptly stuffed and groomed and then the picking of outfits began (note to self: we are out of ibuprofen).

It was funny to watch each of the three girls and see that they all had unique shopping styles. Tristin quickly made her decision on an outfit and didn't waffle once. She carried it around, patiently waiting for the others and her eyes never swayed.

Marley contemplates. She walks around and looks....and then walks around again....Poker faced until she decides.

Kailey is hilarious (she and Ella are alike in this area). She picks up an outfit and it is thee one....until she sees another one that is!

We finally made decisions, printed out birth certificates and headed to the cash register. I like this picture of Heath just handing over the debit card! Thank you!

After our fun excursion we headed to a swimming/dinner party at Dave and Shirley's house. This was planned after we scheduled Marley's sleepover but I thought it would be fun to take the girls! I informed all the adults there that Marley was under the impression that it was all done in her honor so they kept that on the down low! We even lit up the cake and sang "Happy Birthday!"

We got about on hour of swimming in before the sirens went off for a thunderstorm warning and we headed inside!

The day concluded with getting into p.j.'s and a sleeping bag and watching a movie that Marley had selected for the occasion: 12 Dancing Princesses!

It's almost midnight as I type this and I realize that I have only several minutes left of Marley's birthday. Tomorrow she will wake up and I will have to remind myself for a few days that she is now 6, but eventually it will just be the way it is. Six. Gone are the days of "pulling the wool" over her eyes like when I had my dad call and pretend to be the Grumpy Old Troll from Dora and tell her he was going to be their babysitter for the evening (her eyes got huge and her mouth fell open and she asked me in an astonished voice, "How did you do that?") And gone are the days of spelling out words we don't want her to hear. I know there will be a whole list of new things to look forward to but tonight I think I just want to be a little sad that my baby is six.

Bye, Bye Ursella!

The weekend before last a bunch of us had a rummage sale. What can I say that Carrie & Beth didn't already cover so eloquently in their blogs? It was so much fun to hang out with friends, get rid of junk and end up with some extra money! The glamour shot session with Carrie was my favorite part. Chasing baby clothes across my front yard and picking up shards of broken glass because of the blustery wind was my least favorite.

I had asked the girls if they had any toys they would like to sell and told them they could pocket the money.

Without skipping a beat Ella tilted her head and looked at me out of the side of her squinted eyes and said "Just one".

I asked her what and she said (pronouncing each and every syllable) "Ursella".

The story behind Ursella is that Ella REALLY dislikes her! We tease her on occasion and will try to get her to buy things with Ursella on them or we sometimes call her UrsELLA and this sends her into a fit of rage! (I know, great parenting...but it is too funny). So last Christmas my family had a white elephant gift exchange and there was an Ursella figure passed around that we ended up with.

Over the past 6 months we have proceeded to torture Ella w/ it by randomly laying her on Ella's pillow at night or sitting her in Ella's chair at breakfast, etc. Needless to say she gets a little upset.

The next morning Ella came carting Ursella out of the house and placed her in the "toy department".

She didn't sell!!!

Setting up for the rummage ended up turning into a late night. Carole Holmes had brought over 2 recliners to sell and Marley kept saying she wanted to sleep outside in the recliner. I was busy pricing and before I knew it she had done just that!

Summer Heat

Marley, Isaac, Elijah, Lucas and Ella

Ella trying out some flippers

Looks like the flippers are going to be perfect

Marley always making time for a pose

Thank you to Dave & Shirley who let us use their incredible pool in the summer! The girls and I both get to hang out with friends and who knows, this may be the "year of the tan" for me!!

I Wonder.....

I wonder why I am so blessed

Freckles & Pig Tails! I love these girls!

My friend Traci snapped this photo and it is great. She is opening her own photography business where she will specialize in "on location/in-home" photos of your children. You should check out her website @ tracifalderphotography.blogspot.com.

I wonder how that got there

Ella in her "I didn't do it" T-shirt that my mom sent her. This pretty much sums up Ella. She is mischievous, but so darn cute!! She received this T in the mail after an episode involving our cat, Tiki, having been shut in Heath's p.j. drawer for (according to our calculations) about 8 hours!

She, of course, insists "I DIDN'T DO IT!"

One quick story about Ella. You may or may not know that she has a VERY high tolerance for pain. Instances that would have had me wailing she has merely pouted for a moment ~ but yesterday's happenings take the cake!

She was getting in the bath when I asked her to pick up some paper she left in the floor. She started to run to do it and began to whimper a little. I thought she was pouting until she sat down, lifted her foot in the air and said in a pitiful little voice "I got poked, I got poked."

I bent down to look and a sewing needle was sticking out of her foot!! I tried to pull it out but I couldn't. I calmly said, "It's ok, mama will be right back" while I lightheadly rushed to the garage for needle nose pliers. Yet even as I pryed it out w/ the tool she simply whimpered a little.

Never a tear or a scream.

It was 3/4 of an inch in her foot.

As I sat staring at the needle, she got up and walked away and said with her back to me, "I wonder how that got there?"

I wonder why Ella flunked Hugging 101

Ella "hugging" Logan Ross at Logan's b-day party!

Ella "hugging" Marley at Ivanhoe's

Ella "hugging" Teryn Kerschner after a play date